Mobile communications are endemic throughout modern society. For many, use of a mobile device, such as a cellular phone, is a primary means of telephonic communications. While early-generation cellular communication systems provided for voice communications and limited data communications, successor generation systems provide for increasingly, data-intensive, data communication services. The infrastructures of cellular, and cellular-like, communication systems have been installed throughout much of the populated areas of the world. And, communications by way of cellular, and other mobile communication systems, in some areas, approaches or even exceeds the use of conventional wireline, telephonic communication systems.
Mobile stations, used in a mobile communication system to communicate are typically of small physical dimensions and weights. Mobile stations are, generally, easily carried by a subscriber or other user, permitting its use, to initiate or to terminate communications at almost any time. Many useful user interface mechanisms are included in even the least-costly, low-tier mobile stations. For instance, communication-termination alerts and annunciations, in many of such devices, are able to be selected by the subscriber or other user of the mobile station. The amplitude, of the annunciation and its ring-type, e.g., and other alert-types are all often times user selectable. And, if the user is unable to receive the terminating communication, the network of the system often times include store-and-forward capabilities, such as voice mail capabilities or e-mail, or other, message storage capabilities.
While many of the conventional, mobile stations provide for multiple alert-types and other handling actions, user preferences must generally be manually entered into the mobile station by the user. The user may, e.g., elect to mute, silence, or turn-off the mobile station so that an alert of a terminating communication does not interrupt a meeting, school class, movie theatre performance, or other professional or social situation.
Many of such events are known to the user in advance, sometimes well in advance. And, the user sometimes uses a calendar application to note the events. A calendar application is implementable on, e.g., a computer work station or directly at a mobile station.
The existing need manually to enter, or otherwise provide, instructions to the mobile station to control its manner of alerting of terminating communication is sometimes problematical. The user must remember both to make the adjustment and also actually cause the adjustments to be made. Sometimes, the user fails to remember, and sometimes the user, even when remembering to make the adjustment, fails actually to make the adjustment. As a result, an alert of a terminating communication is generated in manners contrary to the user's preference.
Additionally, even if the user makes the adjustment, the user might forget to make a subsequent readjustment so that subsequent alerts are not later generated in a desired manner. And, as a result, a user might miss a terminating communication even though the user is available to receive the communication.
If a manner could be provided by which better to facilitate communication handling of a terminating communication in accordance with a user preference, improved mobile-station operation would be possible.
It is in light of this background information related to mobile stations that the significant improvements of the present invention have evolved.